Photography Books to Better your Nikon D90 Skills!

I've basically listed every Nikon D90 "how to Book" ever made on this blog over the last year and a half. So now I wanted to list some general Photography books for you that will help us all be better photographer's. So here's the short list of the best photography books available.....

1. : How to Shoot Great Photographs with a Film or Digital Camera (3rd Edition) by Bryan Peterson - For serious amateur photographers who already shoot perfectly focused, accurately exposed images but want to be more creative with a camera. More Info.


2. Learning to See Creatively: Design, Color & Composition in Photography (Updated Edition) by Bryan Peterson - Almost everyone can "see" in the conventional sense, but developing photographic vision takes practice. Learning to See Creatively helps photographers visualize their work, and the world, in a whole new light. More Info.

3. Beyond Portraiture: Creative People Photography by Bryan Peterson - Take great pictures of people--beyond portraits, photos that capture a moment. More Info.

4. Capturing the Light: An Inspirational and Instructional Guide to Landscape Photography by Peter Watson - This outstanding book showcases 90 of Peter Watson's stunning photographs, all capturing the light to perfection. Each photograph is allocated a page for display. More Info.

5. Photographic Composition By Tom Grill - Effective image design, a key ingredient in successful photographs, is a skill that any serious photographer must learn and master. More Info.


6. Creative Nature and Outdoor Photography by Brenda Tharp - Professional and amateur photographers alike will find an array of surefire strategies in Creative Nature and Outdoor Photography, an indispensable guide that demonstrates how to use classic visual design principles to create strong, compelling, nature photos. More Info.  Kindle Addition

7. Photography by Barbara London - A picture tells a thousand stories, but the one it doesn't tell is how the shot was made. Barbara London and John Upton's Photography is an all-inclusive look at the craft of photography. More Info.

8. John Shaw's Nature Photography Field Guide by John Shaw - An updated bestseller, this book of extraordinarily beautiful photographs of nature contains state-of-the-art instruction on how any photographer can aim for equally impressive results every time a camera is focused on the great outdoors. More Info.

9. The Digital Photography Book by Scott Kelby - "Kelby's laid-back writing style is perfect for those looking for fascinating insights without getting caught up in technical detail. More Info.


10. The Betterphoto Guide to Digital Photography (Amphoto Guide Series) by Jim Miotke - This practical, lesson-based workbook gives readers a step-by-step tutorial in getting bright, crisp, beautiful pictures from their digital cameras every time. More Info.


11. The Hot Shoe Diaries: Big Light from Small Flashes - After spending more than thirty years behind the lens—working for National Geographic, Time, Life, and Sports Illustrated—Joe McNally knows about light. He knows how to talk about it, shape it, color it, control it, and direct it. Most importantly, he knows how to create it...using small hot shoe flashes. More Info.


12. The Moment It Clicks: Photography secrets from one of the world's top shooters - THE FIRST BOOK WITH ONE FOOT ON THE COFFEE TABLE, AND ONE FOOT IN THE
CLASSROOM  More Info

13. LIFE Guide to Digital Photography: Everything You Need to Shoot Like the Pros -Photography has been the business and the passion of LIFE since the original weekly magazine's inception in 1936, and it continues to be the business and passion of LIFE Books and LIFE.com in the new millennium. More Info

I personally learned a lot from reading "Understanding Exposure" What photography books have you read lately? Do you recommend any good books?

Smoke Photography with the Nikon D90!

Stuck in the house on a rainy day? Try some smoke photography for some indoors fun! Do you see in the image a profile of an old sea mariner with his hat and long beard, lol

So i decided to give this smoke photography a go and it turned out not so bad. Here's how i shot these photos with my D90 and what you'll need.

First I stopped by the fabric store and bought a yard and a half of black fabric for the background. Then I stopped at a smoke shop and got some incense sticks to use for the smoke. When i got home i waited until it was dark outside and went to work. I set the black fabric material up behind the table I was using, (make sure you set the background back pretty far because you don't want any light to hit it) next I stuck the incense stick in some wax and put it on a plate on the table.

Now for the flash and light. I used my SB600 flash off camera in commander mode and dialed down the power to -3.0. Next was the tricky part, I made a cone with a black piece of 8x10 craft paper and slid it on the flash and aimed the cone at were the smoke would be. Again the reason for this was to try and keep the light from the flash off the background. Next i got out my little head lamp and aimed it also at the spot (opposite side from the flash) the smoke would be. This was so I could manual focus on the smoke I was shooting in the dark. (you can leave this light on the whole time your snapping pictures so you can focus.

Now that i got everything set up I was ready to set up the D90. I put on my Tamron 17-50 lens and set the camera to aperture priority and went with f/8 and F/11. Since I was shooting flash the shutter speed was auto at 200. I did not use a tripod which made things a lot easier.

I fired up the incense and started snapping away at the smoke and that was it basically. When I was done I deleted the bad ones and uploaded the good ones to Photoshop elements 6 and started working with them.

Use your invert button to get a white background and back to get the black background. To add color I used the hue and saturation slider and played with that. To add color to specific areas I used the selection command and while selected I used the hue and saturation which works great! Anyway that's it...I hope you give it a try I'm sure I'll be doing some more soon.




Here's a good site that explains more.

2010 Mavericks Surf Competition with the Nikon D90!

I'm sorry, hope you weren't expecting actual shots of the surfers because we couldn't even see them from the beach since the surfers were a half mile off shore and it was very hazy. So anyway the reason for the post is what was suppose to be all about the surf competition turned into about 50 or so spectators that were injured by a huge wave that just came up and wiped out everyone! We were on the beach also but were not hit by the big one...you probably heard about it on the news. I got one quick shot of the big one just as it was hitting the first people. I also videoed a little bit of a smaller wave as I and everyone else tried to scale the cliff to avoid it. It was quite the day at the beach......

Best Wide Angle Lens For the Nikon D90?

Recently I’ve been very intrigued by purchasing a true wide angle lens for my D90. When I say true wide angle I’m talking about anything under 18mm. I see there are a lot of choices out there but after researching a ton of information online it’s definitely apparent you or I will want to get a wide angle lens made specifically for our cameras APS-C type sensor. I read this from Tom Atkins over at Photo.net he said “One of the disadvantages of small sensor APS-C Digital SLR cameras is that the 1.6x multiplier/crop factor makes all your existing 35mm wide-angle lenses into "not so wide" angle lenses.” Our Nikon D90 camera is slightly better, with a 1.5x multiplier/crop, but still basically suffers from the same problem. So here are all the wide angle lenses that are made for our D90 APS-C sensor! If this is not correct please someone let me know, Thanks! I'm personally leaning toward the Tokina 11-16 2.8 right now.
Click a lens to read the user reviews!

1. Nikon 12-24mm f/4G ED IF Autofocus DX Nikkor Zoom Lens
2. Tokina 11-16mm f/2.8 AT-X116 Pro DX for Nikon AF
3. Tokina 12-24mm f/4 AT-X Pro DX for Nikon AF
4. Tamron SP AF11-18mm F/4.5-5.6 Di-II LD Aspherical [IF]
5. Tamron SP AF10-24mm F/3.5-4.5 Di-II LD Aspherical [IF]
6. Sigma 10-20mm f/4-5.6 EX DC HSM Lens for Nikon
7. New Sigma 8-16mm F4.5-5.6 DC HSM

Hope this helps a little in your quest for an ultra wide angle lens for your D90!

Nikon D90 Camera Bags - Lowepro Slingshot 200!

Someone recently asked me about camera bags and i couldn't tell them anything because I've only owned my Lowepro Slingshot 200 AW Bag and I love it! The reviews alone are all great so i wont go into reviewing it I'll let you read all about it if you want to. What i wanted to do is just show the 200 with my D90 and gear! If you have the 70-300VR it fits just fine, even left on the camera. What bag do you all use?

Here's a photo of everything usually in my bag. Camera, Tamron 17-50, Nikon 70-300vr, SB600, Battery Charger, Plugs, Filters, Cleaners and i still have room for a little 50mm if i had one. I've even put one leg of my Manfrotto 725B Digi Tripod in the little strap on the side for a hike up a mountain.






Here's one with the 70-300vr on the camera.

Check out the Reviews Here!

Opteka HD² Slide Copier for Nikon D90!

Something new for you if you have old slides you want to transfer into your D90 camera and print out!
The Opteka High Definition Digital Duplicator screws into the filter thread of the lens adapter or existing lens. This means it can be connected to almost all digital cameras. The built-in high definition close-up optics allow you to transfer slides into digital cameras easily with no lose in quality. You will actually enhance you pictures!
Built-in high definition² close-up optics allow you to transfer slides into digital cameras easily with no loss in quality

Very easy to attach and use with any 67mm or 52mm threaded lens
High Definition² - 2 times the resolution of standard high definition copiers
Digital multi-coating greatly reduces the appearance of lens flare and ghosting caused by reflections

Read the Reviews Here!

JumpStart Video Training Guide for the Nikon D90!

Here's something new I just found. A Nikon D90 2 DVD set from Jumpstart called JumpStart Video Training Guide on DVD for the Nikon D90 Digital Camera. Looks interesting! No reviews yet, But I'm sure they are coming....

"Taking pictures is more than just pointing the camera and pressing a button. To get the kind of photos you really want, you'll need to learn a little bit about your camera. You can transition from taking snapshots to producing inspired images that you will cherish forever. It's not hard; these JumpStart Guides from MasterWorks will show you how.

 The following topics are covered on each DVD: The Features and Functions of Your Camera. Manual and Automatic White Balance. ISO Settings. Different Quality Settings. Reading and Using a Histogram. Basic Principles of Photography. Depth of Field. Aperture vs. Shutter Priority. Program Mode. Composition. Getting Sharp Images. Storing and Carrying Your Camera. Selecting and Using a Tripod. Lenses and Filters. Digital Media Options. Getting Your Photos into Your Computer. Tips and Tricks"

Check it out Here!

Op/Tech Pro Nikon D90 Camera Strap

This is the first aftermarket strap that I have ever tried and on my D90 I love it! I wish I would have purchased this long ago. It feels so much better then the one's that Nikon gives you with their cameras you won't believe it! Anyway I like this OP/Tech Camera strap so much I thought I'd share. For me I like the fact it's allows me more room to strap it over my neck and through one arm to shoot the way I like. Also it's very comfortable around your neck. It's pretty cool looking also if that matters! So what kind of strap are you using?

Check out More Photos and Reviews Here!

Nikon D90 Mirror Lock -Up?

Mirror Lock up (MLU) what is it and does the D90 have it?

What: Mirror lock-up (often abbreviated to MLU) is a feature employed in many Single Lens Reflex (SLR) cameras. It allows the operator to reduce vibration-induced motion blur during exposure. From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Does the Nikon D90 have it? Unfortunately no but it does have a pretty darn good alternative. This is called Exposure Delay Mode, Page 183 of your manual. It's says, "In situations where the slightest camera movement can blur pictures, Exposure Delay Mode On can be selected to delay shutter release until about 1 second after the shutter release button is pressed and the mirror is raised".

D90 setting for Exposure Delay Mode: Custom Settings (Pencil) OK: d Shooting/display OK: d10 Exposure Delay Mode OK: On OK

I definitely see myself trying this mode next time i'm using my tripod for a landscape shot or something! Seems like a no brainier to me if I might get an even sharper photo. I've read mostly good things about how this isn't "True MLU" like some camera's have but those who have tried both say the D90's Exposure Delay Mode is a pretty good alternative to the "True MLU". What do you Think?

Illustration Courtesy Photozone

Dawn Technology adds New GPS for the Nikon D90

Well it's been pretty quite on the Nikon D90 front but here's something new that might be of interest. I see this GPS is about $150.

Dawn Technology has added a new GPS unit to the range, called the Mini 3L. Salient features include a built-in 8MB data logger for storing in excess of 260k data points, password protection, last fixed repeat and instant last fixed repeat modes.

Built-in data logger – 8MB flash memory for up to 260,096 data points

Data can be password protected

Last Fixed Repeat (Indoor Fix): Repeat the last fixed when lost or no GPS signal. It continual report the last good fixed position to camera in any indoor without GPS coverage.

Instant Last Fixed Repeat (Instant Indoor Fix): The di-GPS Mini 3L read the last good fixed data in the data logger after each power on. It continual report the last good fixed position even after power reset (data logger enabled). No more reacquisition needed after power reset or reconnected to the cameras.

Three ways switch (On/Auto/Off).

Ultra low power consumption, new SiRF Low Power Single Chip (36mA typical).

Very compact size 54mm x 37mm x 17mm.Mounted on the flash accessory shoe or attached to the camera strap.

20-Channel GPS Receiver for fast acquisition and reacquisition.

200,000 effective correlators for fast TTFF (Time To First Fix) and Extremely fast TTFF at low signal levels.

Very high sensitivity (Tracking Sensitivity: -159 dBm), provide superior positing information in environments, through urban canyons, and under dense foliage.

Built-in WAAS Demodulator.NMEA 0183 data protocol.

Built-in Super Capacitor to reserve system data for rapid satellite acquisition.Built-in patch antenna, no external antenna required.

No Setup Required.

Check it out Here!